


alone time

by maketea



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Dorks in Love, Established Relationship, F/M, Making Out, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:21:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24736084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maketea/pseuds/maketea
Summary: ladybug and chat noir always struggle to find some alone time.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 37
Kudos: 267





	alone time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stylostique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stylostique/gifts).



> HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY LISA!!!
> 
> this is actually like. the first of two gifts i wanted to write for u KDJDJD... i realised my original idea was taking longer than expected so i wrote you this for the time being because i still wanted to give u a gift! i love you so very very much, thank you for our amazing conversations and being one of the most intelligent people i know🥺 ilu

Ladybug, upon seeing Chat Noir, could have crossed the rooftop and called for his attention, just like she usually did.

But they were dating now, so if she could sneak up and greet him with a hug, why wouldn't she?

_ "Salut!"  _ she yelled, and flung her arms around him. 

He jumped, and she laughed. It was their normal pattern, but for the first time, the roles were reversed, and Chat Noir's cat ears had failed him, giving way to her.

Nevertheless, he smiled, turning his head to look around. " _ Salut, chérie _ ." He kissed her.

"' _ Chérie'?" _

Despite the way it had slipped off his tongue, Chat Noir blushed.

"I like it," Ladybug said, kissing him again. " _ Chéri _ ."

She was the first to stand, and offered her hand to pull him to his feet, too. Instead of pulling away, Ladybug intertwined their fingers.

"Where did you want to take me?" she said.

"Somewhere nice." 

"Oh, you're being mysterious?" 

"Don't you like a little mystery?"

Chat Noir leaned close. Ladybug contemplated giving him another kiss, but he pulled away before she had the chance.

"It's this abandoned music hall I found a few nights ago," he said, and pointed somewhere in the distance with his baton. "That way."

She eyed him. This sounded not much better than the 'empty' cinema he had taken her to last time, where they had sat at the back of a two-star romcom and went in for a kiss — only to be interrupted by a child wandering into the aisle, asking her favourite superheroes to help find her mother.

"An… abandoned music hall?" Ladybug said.

Chat Noir looked away from the skyline to face her, instead, and offered a gentle smile. 

"You'll love it, I promise." He took her in by the waist and kissed her. "It's beautiful — and secluded. We can finally have some time alone together."

"Being in public doesn't seem to stop you from kissing me up." 

"But I  _ miss _ being alone with you." He said it with a heart-tugging sigh, one that she herself had used time and time again. "It's like we never get any time together anymore."

Ladybug stroked his cheek. "I know what you mean."

There was no handbook for balancing a relationship with your superhero partner with saving the world from an indefatigable (truly — how else would there be 3AM  _ and  _ 7AM akumas?) supervillain.

But if there were, the preface would probably be something like this:

  * _Throw out any expectations of making out._


  * No, really, throw them out.


  * Seriously.


  * Your local supervillain works twenty-four hours a day, plus overtime, somehow.


  * There is always an akuma. Always. Don't even try and kiss your superhero partner. The disappointment will make you want to cry.



In short, it was hard. But they found their little pockets of privacy every once in a while.

They held each other like that until Ladybug straightened, unwinding her yo-yo. "Lead the way?"

"It would be my pleasure, My Lady."

He took her deep into the city, then back out again. The streets emptied the farther they went on, and it felt like they had been swinging from rooftop to rooftop for at least an hour before Chat Noir took her hand and leapt onto the pavement.

The building, perhaps once filled with grandeur, was unassuming. The entrance had been boarded up, and the list of performances was dim, frozen to a display at least a few years prior. 

Through a jimmied-ppen window on the side, Ladybug saw golden light.

"Ready to go?" Chat Noir asked.

She nodded. He guided her to the window, pushed it all the way open, and helped her up.

"Ladies first," he said.

She giggled. "What a gentleman."

As soon as she clambered onto the sill, Ladybug gasped.

"Oh, wow," she breathed. "Did you do… all of this?"

Though they were only behind the main hall's emergency exit, Ladybug's breath had caught in her throat. Candles stitched the perimeter of the room — candles in glass jars, in makeshift holders, some even balanced in empty mugs or glasses. 

"I mean, it's not much." Chat Noir rubbed the back of his neck, then pulled himself inside, too. "But this isn't all of it."

He led her up to the emergency door, and pushed it open.

Inside was the main hall, stalls with well-worn upholstery, galleries looking down on the venue, and a grand stage strewn with rose petals.

And candles. Candles  _ everywhere _ .

Ladybug stepped inside. "Oh my God… how did you…?"

"Uh, well, I didn't want to switch on the lights in case someone had to pay the electricity bill, or something, so I just kept coming down here after patrols and putting a few candles here and there."

The tall walls were washed with gold, and wavered with the flicker of each individual flame.

Ladybug turned to look at him. He was golden, too. His cheeks were the colour of honey; she leaned onto her tiptoes, and kissed both.

"I love it. Thank you."

He smiled. "You wanna look around?"

"Yes!"

It occurred to Ladybug only after she raced ahead that he probably meant to lead her around, but when she glanced at him from her place in the stalls, he only smiled, shook his head, and made his way up to the stage.

Running her hands along the chairs, Ladybug watched as he picked up a candle, clambered up, and, as he brought the light closer, set it on top of what she could now decipher as a piano. He then dusted off the stool, adjusted it, and sat down. 

"You play the piano?" Ladybug said. From the stalls, the acoustics carried her voice all around the venue.

Chat Noir stretched his arms, lifted the lid, and set one hand on the keys. "I could play with my eyes closed."

"Eyes closed, huh?"

Ladybug leapt over the first row of chairs and hauled herself up on stage. She jogged up to Chat Noir, pushed his stool back, then dropped herself into his lap.

He blinked at her.

She smiled. "You can't see the keys, right?"

And then he caught on. "You really want me to play with you sitting on me?"

"Oh, I could get off, if you want, and sit all the way over there." Ladybug pointed at the seat farthest back in the locked upper gallery. She would have had to yo-yo herself up there, and the upholstery there would be tenfold worse than that of the stalls. 

"No, no." He kept her in place by the waist. "I'd rather you stayed here."

She grinned. "That's what I thought."

Even carrying their weights combined, Chat Noir managed to pull the stool closer to the piano. He had to press himself flush against her to reach over to the keys.

This, unsurprisingly, didn't bother her one bit.

He took a moment to adjust his hands, but didn't take his eyes off her.

Finally, he began to play.

It wasn't a song Ladybug recognised, but she admittedly didn't spent much time studying music. But her lack of familiarity didn't stop her from enjoying it. His smile to her was soft and his eyes even softer, and she felt his knee rise and fall behind her like a metronome every time he stepped down on the pedal.

It took an embarrassingly long time for her to realise that, no matter how beautiful the song may have been, it was not the music she was enraptured by.

Ladybug cupped his face. "You're lovely."

"I've had a lot of practice—"

"I'm not talking about the piano."

His hands faltered behind her. Chat Noir admired her for a moment, then continued playing.

"You're the lovely one, My Lady," he said.

Not once did they look away from one another. Ladybug kept her hands around his face, stroking the apple of his cheek with her thumb, tracing the crinkle in his mask his smile left.

"I love you," she said.

Before he could reply, she leaned down, and kissed him. He relaxed as soon as he tasted her. He played a diminuendo, and didn't take his foot off the pedal.

Ladybug rested her mouth at the corner of his lips. "You're so incredible. You can kiss me  _ and  _ play piano at the same time."

" _ Well _ ," he laughed, "anyone can do two things at the same time — that doesn't mean they do them well."

"Trust me," she said, and buried her hands in his hair. "You do it  _ purr- _ fectly."

"Oh?" He grinned, and so did she, and they rubbed their noses together. "I'm a good kisser?"

"The best." She adjusted herself, so close she wondered how he managed her weight on a backless piano stool. "Now that we're alone…"

"Now that we're alone...?"

Ladybug let her momentary flush answer for her, then pressed her mouth to his.

He read her wish off her kisses like she'd whispered it in his ear; Chat Noir took one hand off the piano, and wrapped his arm tight around her.

She gasped. "You stopped playing."

"God forbid I hold my girlfriend while she makes out with me." He rolled his eyes. "Want me to let go?"

He removed his grip. Then Chat Noir tipped forward just a little, and left Ladybug clinging to his shoulders to stay upright.

"Not nice," she said.

"Can I hold you?"

"Yes."

Her affirmative was all it took. Chat Noir forgot about the piano — even went as far to push the stool back — and embraced Ladybug, going for her jaw and creeping to her lips.

It had been far too long since they last kissed like this, she thought as he put a hand to the back of her neck and held her in, making his way to her ear lobe. The last time they were this close — Ladybug jerked (he had given her thighs a squeeze) — was a stolen moment in an apartment corridor, when he had pushed her up against a wall as soon as the akuma victim they were dropping off shut the door.

Now, when she tugged his head back and kissed his cheeks, his nose, his chin, his lips, they had no qualms about their breaths being heard through a thin wall. They had the whole music hall to themselves.

A door creaked open somewhere behind her.

The sound ricocheted off the enormous ceiling — Ladybug jumped, and Chat Noir tore his lips from hers to stare wide-eyed over her shoulder.

"Hello?" she called.

The emergency door they came through was ajar.

There was no response. Quickly, Ladybug scrambled off Chat Noir's lap.

"I thought you said this place was abandoned?" she hissed.

"Wouldn't you? The entrance was boarded up!"

She shivered, still staring at the open emergency door. Ladybug wasn't afraid — oh no, she'd never be afraid — but she truly had thought they were alone. She folded her arms in front of her. At least she had gathered her bearings enough to feel embarrassed.

"You stay here," Chat Noir said, and when she turned around, she saw him standing from the piano stool. "I'll go check it out."

Now alone, Ladybug pulled out her yo-yo, and braced herself.

Then, she watched the emergency door shut, and heard Chat Noir laugh. 

"What is it?" she called over.

Chat Noir emerged from the aisle furthest away. He smiled over at something in front of him.

Ladybug watched as a scrawny Burmese cat slinked out of the aisle, rubbing itself against Chat Noir's ankles.

She dropped her yo-yo. "A cat."

"She must have got in through the window." He jogged back up to the stage, and tapped his thigh until the cat looked at him. "Isn't she cute?"

She (as Chat Noir somehow had identified) leapt up, tottering up to Ladybug. Chat Noir was besotted.

"You left the  _ window _ open?" Ladybug said. "Lucky it was just the cat!"

"Relax, Bugaboo." He approached her, much like the Burmese currently winding around her ankles in his fluidity. Chat Noir put his arms around Ladybug. "I closed it. Now it's just you and me."

She smiled. "Yeah."

The urge to kiss him almost overcame her. He was right there, lips still swollen and hair still mussed, and the muscles in her thighs were still sore from straddling him for so long.

The cat sprawled itself out on the stage. Chat Noir broke their spell, crouched down, and ran a hand through her fur.

"Hey, do you mind if you look after the kitty while I head over to the supermarket for a sec?" he asked, not looking up.

Ladybug spluttered. "The  _ supermarket _ ? Why?"

"Look at her!" He rubbed the cat's tummy. "She's so skinny! I'm gonna get some cat food."

Before Ladybug could process what he had said, he had already shot to his feet, and started for the edge of the stage.

"Wait!" She grabbed onto his elbow. 

He turned.

She flushed.

"I'll miss you," she said quietly, and wanted to die right after.

His face softened. "Aw, My Lady."

When he came closer, she buried her face into his collarbone. She was always clingier after they got as close as they did five minutes ago. After feeling him hold her in his lap, kiss her mouth, her cheek, her neck, Ladybug didn't want to let him go. Who knew how long he'd take at the supermarket?

Chat Noir took her by the shoulders, and kissed her. "I'll be quick."

She wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged.

He laughed. "I promise."

Chat Noir never broke a promise.

She pulled back — reluctantly, nevertheless — and sighed. "Okay. You better not disappear."

He stole one more kiss. "You could never keep me away from you, Bugaboo."

Ladybug stood onstage, watching Chat Noir jump down, then leave through the emergency exit.

She looked down at the cat, smiled, and leaned down to stroke her.

Even if they didn't get much alone time together, Ladybug still cherished every moment she shared with Chat Noir.


End file.
